Tagged: doctor strange

I have always been fascinated by the Marvel Comics character ‘Morbius: The Living Vampire’ and now it seems this weirdly obscure oddball will be indeed be brought to life onscreen with Jared Leto in the role. Hmmm….I’ve never been a real big fan of Leto and his recent portrayal of The Joker has further cemented that opinion in my mind. Leto was pretty cool in Bladerunner: 2049 which was in my opinion just an excellent sequel altogether and maybe his portrayal of The Joker has really unfairly tainted him as an actor in my mind. However…

This new Morbius movie will be a Sony Spider-man spin-off movie set in their “Dark Universe”, the same one that the upcoming ‘Venom’ movie takes place in. I’m not quite sure what to think of that yet either as the Sony stuff has been altogether pretty sub par thus far. Whatever the case I’m hoping that perhaps this new line of dark Marvel movies will be a the start of something really unique and perhaps could even lead to a Blade sequel starring Wesley Snipes (who’d likely pass the torch to a younger character). That’s a long shot I know…Still somehow I just can’t wipe this image out of my mind:

It sounds so far like Leto will be playing the scientist Michael Morbius, who while trying to find a cure for a rare blood disease, accidentally transforms himself into a freaky ass living vampire. Though disgusted by his own bloodthirst, he chooses to prey upon vile criminals he deems unworthy of life. Kinda like if ‘Dexter’ was vampire type of thing going on. I hope they at the very least give Morbius some version of his classic costume and maybe even have him crossover into a Venom movie. I guess the more I look at Leto the more I can see how he might actually look pretty good as the character. I’d love for them not to skimp on the horror aspect of Morbius’ appearance either, don’t try and make him some sexy bloodsucker, let’s face it they blew it trying to make Leto’s Joker be some super ripped, tatted up, Faygo drinkin’, wise ass Juggalo. With Mobius, give him some creepy prosthetics and make him a freaky anti-hero playing up his dark roots.

I’m pretty intrigued by this idea of bring the creepy cult creature to the big screen and I’m willing to keep an open mind about Leto being cast as well. Sony, somehow similar to DC, seems to mess up their movies, the bar is set low for a character this obscure to Marvel fans so perhaps they can make this C-List character an A-Lister. Please can we just take a break from the sexy vampire trope though while doing so? Oh and please don’t make this character feel like he’s heading off to an Insane Clown Posse concert? Please?!

I’ve expressed my interest in lucid dreaming here at Universal Dork a couple times in the past and today I thought I’d take a moment to talk about ‘astral projection’. First though, if you’re not quite sure what lucid dreaming is let me make it simple, it’s when you have a very vivid dream and something within the dream triggers you to become aware that you are dreaming (movies like Inception & Dreamscape are good examples). In many of these cases often with a little practice and focus you can learn to have them quite regularly. To be honest it makes movies like ‘Inception’ feel pretty boring. It’s one of the most incredible things I’ve experienced and anyone can do it with a little effort.

There’s another practice that’s linked to lucid dreaming called ‘astral projection‘, also known as an ‘out of body experience’ or OBE. I’ve worked a ton on different methods to experience this phenomenon with various degrees of success. I can tell you with honesty that it’s lead to the most bizarre & unexplainable experiences of my existence. I’m to this day a bit uncertain exactly what astral projection really is at it’s core, some believe it’s just an elaborate lucid dream while others believe it’s the complete separation of consciousness from the physical body. I intend to find out for myself what the truth really is behind it. Thus far I’ve had several unexplainable experiences that have lead me to believe that perhaps there’s abilities humans have that involve being able to enter into different dimensions of existence that are not of our physical material world. It’s also made me question heavily my beliefs on life after death. Perhaps there’s more to us than just our bodies of flesh and bone? Continue reading →

Hellboy 3 has from nowhere, suddenly become a real possibility and I’m pretty damn excited about it! I’ve been ranting about getting a third movie made here for a long ass time and with Guillermo del Toro’s recent fan fueled poll bringing the movie back into the limelight it seems it now has a real chance of happening. The movie has been talked about now for almost a decade and because it didn’t make a killing at the box office, making a third movie has been a tough sell for those big greedy Hollywood Studios. Over the years however the popularity of the unique oddball superhero franchise and comic book have gained quite a bigger following than they had back in 2008. So it could it finally be time for Hellboy to get the praise he deserves? I’d certainly say so!

For me the comic book series and all of it’s offshoot titles that Mike Mignola has produced over the years remain to me the most solid superhero comics of the past decade. Though the movies and the Hellboy comic series differ in many ways, mainly in terms of comedy, I think the movies did a great job delivering the heroic demon to the masses. The characters look absolutely amazing and del Torro is likely the one responsible for that. Ron Perlman fits the part like no other could and the rest of the crew like Abe Sapien, Johann Krauss & Liz Sherman couldn’t be represented any better in my opinion. The movies perhaps give us a bit of a lighter side of things than what you will see in the comics and added some romance into the story (which I actually kind of like as the Mignola comics rarely touch on that aspect of things) while visually making the seemingly impossible come vibrantly to life. I don’t think there’s a director I would have trusted more with Hellboy.Continue reading →

This awesome cover from The Incredible Hulk #293 sure does pack a powerful & pissed off punch!! A great piece of work from Brett Blevin’s rad cover from 1983, you can almost feel how much pain the Thing must be feeling here and not to mention the sheer agony of Reed Richards as we notice he’s tied in knots! Interesting enough this epic battle takes place in Banner’s mind where a savage “nightmare” version of the Hulk has been plaguing his own dreams! Soon enough we all know just who’s controlling Banners nightmares and sending the Banner Hulk back into a savage mindless beast! This leads up to a storyline that is basically Planet Hulk but sending him into the Crossroads-a mutli-dimensional realm where anything can happen and The Hulk is no longer the strongest one there is! This is a great era for hardcore Hulk fans…

The big news it seems is that Ryan Reynolds will be reprising his role as Deadpool again-Yipee! Wait, why am I supposed to be excited about this again?! Oh wait, my bad he already played the character…in the most disappointing superhero flick of all time!! Yep “X-Men Origins: Wolverine” makes Brett Ratner’s X-men 3: The Last Stand look like an Academy Award winner! Yeah that Wolverine movie was THAT bad. So now we get the news that Reynolds is going to get a second chance, and I believe everyone deserves a second chance but it leads me to the question: Has Ryan Reynolds ever starred in an actual good movie ever?!

Hey Deadpool-Quit reminding me that we made that movie together ok?!!

Well he did star in R.I.P.D. which I um actually had to turn off because it was so bad. He starred in Blade: Trinity which well I think I may have actually left the theater during way back in 2004. Wait he did star already as a superhero, yeah you remember The Green Lantern from 2011? Nope me neither.

He starred in the sorta Ok-ish Amityville Horror remake, I guess. I know he was in some crappy romantic comedies one where he wore a fat suit or something. I mean is there any movie where he’s actually at least funny? I don’t mean to be a total hater here, but I was less than impressed with that crappy short Deadpool test run in which for some reason Deadpool was a totally not funny, crappy, fully CG character with Reynold’s voice-so what gives? Can someone tell me what all the fuss and excitement is all about already?!

So Guardians of the Galaxy is all the rage suddenly! The movie is on it’s way to being a HUGE hit for Marvel. Well I’m sure that’s got all the big wigs in Hollywood and at Marvel thinking about what the next big thing is gonna be. It seems that the characters in these movies really don’t have to be A-list characters to hit it big time. Maybe you Avengers aren’t quite as special as you thought you were huh?! Well listen up Marvel and Hollywood, fear not, because I’ve got the 5 superhero teams who who got the muscle to score you another blockbuster! Forget about the X-men, forget about the Justice League, The Avengers? Ha! old fucking news! There’s really only so much of Captain America, Thor and Iron Man that we can take! Here are five lesser known teams that could be the next big thing on the big screen!

5. The Defenders: This is Marvel’s safest bet, The Defenders are the B-list Avengers and always have been. But through time they’ve embarked on some of the most downright bizarre adventures in comic book history. This is because of one character in particular, at the core of the group is Doctor Strange, who Marvel is already getting ready to cast into his own feature film. Also in the group is The Hulk, an Avenger who people now are demanding more of on the big screen, ad on The Silver Surfer, who’s one of the coolest characters ever and lastly Namor, the first Marvel Mutant and you’ve got the perfect team to head into truly Strange territory in the movies.

This movie I have no doubt will at some point be made and if you have any doubt that this could be a great big screen adventure take a moment to read The Defenders mini series from 2005 it’s the perfect reference point to success! It’s jam packed with action and some really great comedy, mostly revolving around the Hulk’s sex life!

4. The Exiles: This was a great series that was designed as a “What If?” comic for X-men fans, it involved the team traveling to different dimensions, times and alternate realities. It was kinda like Quantum Leap with superheroes. We have already seen that the alternate timeline stuff works quite well for movie fanatics lately so why not give this team a shot at some big screen glory? You get some weird mashed up versions of popular characters that would sure to quite interesting as well. The Exiles were hired to fix broken realities and the team originally consisted of Blink (Clarice Ferguson, from the Age of Apocalypse), Mimic (Calvin Rankin), Magnus Lensherr (son of Magneto and Rogue),Thunderbird (John Proudstar), Nocturne (Talia Josephine “T.J.” Wagner, daughter of Nightcrawler and Scarlet Witch), and Morph. How’s that for a stellar line up?

3. The Invaders: Ok, how cool was it that the first Captain America movie took place in the 1940’s? Let’s face it this is an awesome era to tell comic book stories-and with the backdrop of WWII it’s the perfect place to kick some Nazi ass-something people never get tired of seeing! We already got a tease of a loose version of the team in the first Captain America movie, but sadly the team didn’t sport costumes or get much development. JJ Field was even cast in the movie as Montgomery Falsworth, who becomes “Union jack” one the most prominent and awesome members of the team.

The movie version could be a mix of The Howling Commandos who had some of it’s members in the Cap movie as well(Dum Dum Dugan!). The movie could take place after Cap’s death and maybe even be developed in the “Agent Carter” Tv series before it hit the big screen. This one would be huge and could take them on an Indiana Jones-esque type of adventure battling the likes of, Baron Zemo, The Hate Monger, Baron Wolfgang Von Strucker, The Master Man & Baron Blood!

2. Alpha Flight: I’m not sure how many times I have to say it-Alpha Flight is just begging to be a big screen smash!! These guys have been a fave of mine since I was a little kid. They’re the Canadian X-men for cryin’ out loud! The movie could have strong ties with the X-films, heck Hugh Jackman could even be in it when Wolverine was a member of the team! The finale of the flick could be when Wolverine goes a-wall and the Flight chases him down ultimately clashing with our very favorite movie X-men! How awesome would that be?

Also visually seeing Sasquatch in action alone would be worth it! Plus Marvel could be the first to introduce the most bad ass first full-on gay superhero to the silver screen-Northstar! This one has success written all over it and the team is always filled with a ton of drama-just read the first 12 issues of the original 1980’s John Byrne run, it’s golden…

1. The Great Lakes Avengers: This one is the one. The Great Lakes Avengers has all the ingredients of big time hit. It’s got heart, drama, a ton of comedy and one other thing going for it the word “AVENGERS” in it’s title. So who are these guys you might ask? Well they are a midwest superhero team that forms in Milwaukee Wisconsin!! They’re huge fans of the Avengers and decide they want to give the superhero stuff a shot themselves. The only problem is that this team is band of regular joe type people with weird superpowers who’ve got zero cred and really zero experience in costumed crimefighting. Think of the movie as a cross between Kick-Ass and Mystery Men. This would be a great one for Edgar Wright or someone who could write something truly hilarious with some well cast comedic actors.

We could get a few cameos from the other real Avengers as well, unintentionally blowing these guys off on the street. Then, the team who we follow from the beginning, as leader Mister Immortal (who no matter how badly he’s injured, can’t die) assembles them all from ads on telephone poles and Craig’s List . He eventually gets them all in to deep with a major Marvel villain, this is where things get serious. This could be one of the most funny superhero movies ever and at the same time have some good serious drama and action as well. Plus it seems that one of it’s members Squirrel Girl already has quite a cult following-To not jump on this now would be a crime Marvel-make it happen!!! Still don’t believe me check out The Great Lakes Avengers trade “Misassembled” from 2005 it’s proof of my claims!

This awesome cover for The Incredible Hulk # 302 which debuted in December of 1984 and is beautifully illustrated by Mike Mignola. It’s from a great Hulk story arc where he is banished to “The Crossroads”, a strange dream-like world in another dimension, which Doctor Strange exiles him to for quite a few issues. You see right around this time The Hulk was causing the world a lot of trouble. Shortly before this however The Hulk inherited Banners brain and was “free” of the monster. Hell he was even asked to join The Avengers again! However it didn’t take long before the monster took full control again and The Hulk became a near mindless monster entirely.

During his time in The Crossroads The Hulk traveled to many strange places, this particular issue he arrived in a bizarre midieval kingdom where there was race of brutal red skinned knights rule the land and as The Hulk learns early on he is no match for their strength. This is a great story as The savage Hulk learns what it feels like to no longer be the strongest one there is. The Hulk gets his ass kicked bad multiple times here like never before.

It also features a green skinned maiden who’s tears turn to flowers who I think may remind Hulk of his old flame Jarella.Oh yeah and no one speaks english so it’s pretty neat as it’s based on the art and some minor narration. Check out these great Crossroad Hulk adventures they’re actually pretty awesome and heartfelt. Also you get some amazing covers by Hellboy’s own Mike Mignola-which is quite special if you’re a Hulk fanatic!